[bksvol-discuss] Re: stories have powerful effects

  • From: "Julie Morales" <mercy421@xxxxxxxxxxx>
  • To: <bksvol-discuss@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
  • Date: Mon, 14 Nov 2005 21:14:46 -0500

Maybe, for us, it's more like sneering at the owners, but for a sighted person 
who doesn't know blind people and doesn't know anything about guide 
dogs...well, that leaves a bad image in their minds about the dogs. It is their 
owners, a lot of times, for sure, but we know that. We're familiar with the 
training of guide dogs, and we're familiar with how the handlers are supposed 
to handle their dogs, but a sighted person may not be, and that's the scenario 
that worries most of us. We hit enough brick walls on our own without having to 
worry about a well-intentioned funny anecdote and what kind of effect that 
might have on someone. Take care.
Julie Morales
To be in your children's memories tomorrow, you need to be in their lives 
today. -- Unknown
mercy421@xxxxxxxxxxx
Windows/MSN Messenger (but not email):
mercy0421@xxxxxxxxxxx
  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: Gary Petraccaro 
  To: bksvol-discuss@xxxxxxxxxxxxx 
  Sent: Monday, November 14, 2005 7:05 PM
  Subject: [bksvol-discuss] Re: stories have powerful effects


  I think it's more a question of sneering at the owners.

    ----- Original Message ----- 
    From: E. 
    To: bksvol-discuss@xxxxxxxxxxxxx 
    Sent: Monday, November 14, 2005 6:34 PM
    Subject: [bksvol-discuss] stories have powerful effects


    Cindy I assume you mean pass along the story of the guide dog who was so 
    disruptive because her person did not choose to control her.  Pass it along 
    if you must.  I do notice that people tend to pass along stories of how 
    badly a dog, particularly a guide dog behaves with a lot of glee.  I think 
    it is one thing to pass along stories among ourselves.  I do get concerned 
    when sighted people gleefully pass along stories about how badly a guide 
    dog behaves, how poorly a guide dog is dealt with by his or her person and 
    how a guide dog failed and did something wrong like run a light, run their 
    person into something or whatever.  Then sighted folks can use those 
    stories to be hesitant about renting to those of us with dogs, or letting 
    us into restaurants and so on.  It may be illegal but all of us with dogs 
    have had issues of access at one time or another.

    I know it is far from your intention to do this but be careful with 
    stoires.  They can have powerful results many unintentional.  I am sorry if 
    this sounds harsh but I have had a number of instances when sighted people 
    just had to come up to me and tell me about bad behavior or guide dogs or 
    their people.

    I am therefore overly cautious about stories of incidents particularly 
    involving food.

    By the way, I have been with Seeing Eye dogs for over thirty years and do 
    know those stoires from my own experience.  But I would be careful telling 
    them to restaurant owners or hotel operators or landlords, or cabbies, bus 
    drivers and so forth.  We still have barriers to access some of them fueled 
    by lack of knowledge.

    E.  

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